


taste the sting a second time

by quietest_one



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, M/M, Multi, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-15
Updated: 2015-07-15
Packaged: 2018-04-09 12:25:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4348721
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quietest_one/pseuds/quietest_one
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kent is eight years old when his words come in, like a bruise in reverse, darkening from bile yellow to blotchy purple to stark black: <strong>‘Hi there. Good game.’</strong></p>
            </blockquote>





	taste the sting a second time

**Author's Note:**

> I have no firsthand experience with anxiety disorders (lucky me) so I hope I’ve done alright with Jack. The usual warnings for oblique mentions of alcoholism and substance abuse.

 

Kent is eight years old when his words come in, like a bruise in reverse, darkening from bile yellow to blotchy purple to stark black: ‘ **Hi there. Good game.** ’

He tries not to be disappointed. Plenty of people have generic soul-words,  _'hi’_  and  _'hello’_  and  _'how are you’_. His mom has no words at all - not that she gives a damn - and he should probably be grateful that there’s more to it than that.  _'Good game’_ , he thinks, and starts to wonder if he can convince his mom to let him carry on playing hockey a while longer.

 

* * *

 

 

Jack doesn’t get his until he’s sixteen, playing in the Q. At this point, he’s pretty resigned to never getting them - 'late bloomer’ is an excuse for only so long. It’s been a rough game, and he’s feeling banged up and a bit shitty after nearly getting boarded and then having the indignity of getting served a penalty for his troubles while the Moosehead D-man skated off to the bench with a smile on his face instead of Jack’s stick in his teeth like he deserved.

So, when he steps off the ice at the end of the third period, exhausted and miserable after a 4-2 defeat, he showers, changes, and thinks nothing of the bruise on his wrist.

“Hey, Zimms, what’s that?” Kent asks.

“Huh?” Jack says.

Kent grabs his arm and pushes his sleeve up roughly. “Your words, man! I think your words are coming in! Fucking finally!!” He peers at Jack’s wrist closely.

Jack frowns and tugs his sleeve back down. “I don’t know, Kenny,” he says.

Kent twists his lip like he’s disappointed. Jack hates it when he looks at him like that.

“If it is, you know I’ll tell you first,” Jack promises.

Kent cocks his head, considering, then beams like a ray of pure summer sunshine.

 

* * *

 

 

' **Hey y'all** ’

Jack is sitting on his bed in his billet house in Rimouski staring at the neat black cursive that has taken up residence on his wrist. It’s small, barely filling the gap between the tendons and the knob of bone. He can cover it with the pad of his thumb.

Something cold and terrible is filling him up inside.

He remembers the day he first met Kent. They were 10, going on 11, playing against each other in some summer league that he barely remembers except for the way that Kent looked on the ice, so fast, such soft hands, racing up the left wing and deking around D-men like they weren’t even there. “Hi there,” Jack said in the handshake line, “Good game,” and Kent’s eyes lit up like fireworks on Canada Day and Jack smiled and gripped his hand and grinned when Kent said–

–Kent said, “Yeah man, you too.”

 

* * *

 

 

He tries to hide it from Kent for as long as he possibly can, which in reality turns out to be about three weeks.

When he finally slips, it’s in the locker room. He strips down to his Under Armour and stretches out his shoulders with a wince, and his sleeve rides up and there’s no way to hide the black words on pale, sweaty skin when Kent is standing there in the stall right. next. to. him.

“Hey,” Kent says low and dark. “You said you’d tell me.”

“I said I’d tell you  _first_ ,” Jack corrects. “And I haven’t told anyone, so technically…”

“Not the point, asshole,” Kent says with a frown.

Jack turns away. He doesn’t want to see Kent look at him like that, like he’s let him down. Jack gets enough of that from his dad, thank you very much.

“What do they say?” Kent asks quietly.

Jack shrugs his Under Armour off and picks up his towel. It’s a blatant avoidance tactic: Kent is like a spooked horse when the guys are naked in the locker room, averting his eyes with robotic determination. Jack doesn’t let himself think about why that might be. He goes off to the showers and by the time he gets back Kent is gone.

 

* * *

 

 

Fifteen hundred miles away, Dicky Bittle, aged eleven and two thirds, stares at the words on his wrist, utterly unable to comprehend them.

 

* * *

 

 

In the middle of November, he gets an email from Bittle.

_I’m coming to Providence this weekend. Take me to dinner after the game?_

Jack stares at the blinking cursor for a long time.

(They play the Aces for the first time that Saturday – Jack knows that Bittle knew this. The thing about being in different conferences is that it doesn’t happen very often, and they have to seize their opportunities when they come.

Kent wins all their faceoffs in the first period and Jack goes back to the dressing room in the intermission feeling like he wants to die all over again. They step it up in the second, and then Jack gets two assists in the third to tie it 3-3 and take the game to overtime, then a shootout. The Aces win in the shootout – Jack’s own shot ricochets off the crossbar with a resounding clang – but a shootout loss is better than nothing.)

 

* * *

 

 

“You were so good!” Bittle says glowingly when they meet up an hour later outside the home locker room.

(Two months into the season, Jack has started to dread the rigmarole of press questions a little less, but it’s still awful, especially when he has a less-than-stellar game. They kept asking him about how it felt to play against Parse, and Jack just didn’t know what to say.)

“Thanks, Bittle,” Jack says. He puts a hand on Bittle’s shoulder. Under his ungloved hand, Bittle’s  _Zimmermann_  jersey feels soft and worn, as though it’s been through several industrial machine washings already. He’s only had it three months. “Where do you want to eat?”

“Oh, um I…” Bittle says. His eyes are huge and round, that deer-in-the-headlights look that Jack had honestly thought they had stamped – or body-checked – out of him by the end of freshman year.

“Zimms!” Parse crows from the other end of the corridor. “Hey man! You played well.”

Jack feels a sudden inexplicable rush of warmth in the pit of his stomach at the sight of Kenny and Bitty in close proximity. As far as he knows, it’s never happened before – that selfie the night of the EpiKegster doesn’t count because _Jack_  hadn’t been there, and the way that Kent had steamrollered them both that night made it all the more forgettable.

“Hey Kenny,” Jack says. He holds his hand out for a fist-bump and gets an unexpected bro-hug instead. “We were going to grab dinner. Want to come with?”

“Sure!” Parse says. “We’re heading to Boston in the morning, so I can hang out until curfew. That cool with you, short stuff?”

“You don’t want to celebrate with your team?” Bittle asks. “I mean, um, of course, you’re welcome to join us. Gosh.”

Parse slings an arm over Bittle’s shoulder and grins that same old shit-eating grin. “Those assholes can deal without me for one night.”

 

* * *

 

 

Jack takes them to a nice Italian restaurant on the riverside. They get a relatively private table, tucked away in a corner where the lighting is dim. It’s probably supposed to be romantic, but it does an equally good job of mostly hiding two NHL players. The restaurant isn’t too busy, but it isn’t empty either, and the turnover also helps to reduce any attention they might usually get on a game day.

“How’ve you been?” Parse asks through a mouthful of linguini. “I’m hearing good things from Coach about you, Zimms.”

Jack tries to restrain a flush. Rival coaches discussing players doing well is not a foreign concept to him, but he still can’t quite believe that he’s finally  _made it_ , enough to be something worthy of being talked about in any context than  _oh that poor Zimmermann boy_  and  _I heard he does crack_.

He shrugs instead, “We’ve got a good team.”

Parse snorts and says, “No offence man, but the Falconers were  _not_  being tipped for a playoff place until they signed you.”

Jack purses his lips and goes back to his pasta.

“Y’all aren’t doing too bad either,” Bittle says to Parse. He then looks amazed and horrified that he actually spoke to Kent Motherfucking Parson.

“Thanks,” Parse says, almost equally surprised. “You’re cute, y’know. What are you doing hanging out with a loser like Zimms?”

“He had me at hello,” Bittle says flippantly, except Kent’s face goes pale and terrible and his fork slips out of his hand.

“I…” Kent says quietly. “Really?”

“Oh gosh, I didn’t mean it like that,” Bittle backtracks quickly. “I mean… I…”

“It’s okay,” Kent says. “I guess I figured you’d find him sooner or later.” The ‘ _I just didn’t realise I’d have to_ see’ is written on his face as plain as day.

The bottom drops out of Jack’s stomach.

“No,” Jack says, desperately, “It’s not… I mean. I. We.” He breathes deeply, counts to eight, exhales, inhales, counts to ten, the way they taught him rehab. “It’s not like that.”

Both Bittle and Kent are staring at him. It makes Jack want to curl up in a ball on the floor and never look at either of them again.

Jack really has no words for this. He honestly never expected to find himself in this situation, trapped between the man he used to love and the man he loves now. The only possible solution is to silently unbutton his cuff and roll it up to expose the seven little letters that ruined his and Kent’s relationship the first time around.

**Hey y’all**

Bittle’s eyes bug out. He makes a noise that’s more like a squeak than anything articulate.

Across the table, Kent’s lips are rolling into a sneer. It’s his old defence, Jack could recognise it anywhere: he’s hurting and the only way he knows to protect himself is to lash out. Kent shoves up his own long sleeved tee to show the block printed words.

**Hi there. Good game.**

Finally, both their eyes settle on Bittle.

“I don’t know what y’all…” Bittle starts, but Kent grabs his arm ruthlessly and forces his jacket sleeve up. Bittle winces a bit, but places his hand palm up on the table-top anyway.

They all stare.

**Want a selfie?**

And God – Bitty  _had_  wanted a selfie. Jack has seen the evidence: Parse wearing his Aces cap, Bitty grinning at the camera. It had made his insides clench uncomfortably when he first saw it, and he could not for the love of Gretzky work out why.

Jack’s breath catches in his throat, because… because now he  _understands_.

“Oh my gosh,” Bittle says under his breath, “Oh my gosh, oh my fucking gosh.”

“This is… totally not what I expected to do tonight,” Kent says after a minute of silent staring has passed.

“Kenny,” Jack says. It’s warm and rumbly and Jack had forgotten that his voice could do that, but it trips off his tongue heedlessly.

Kent’s fingers twitch.

“Does this mean… does this mean what I think it means?” Bittle asks. “You and me and him and oh my gosh this is so much worse than I always thought.”

Jack’s brows beetle.

“Hey, what do you mean worse?” Parse says reflexively. “I’m a fucking catch, short stuff.”

“You’re something alright,” Jack chirps back.

This is possibly the best thing that has ever happened to him.

It’s so easy to remember the miserable nights drinking away the horror of believing that he could never be enough for Kent, couldn’t be what he needed, and this should compound that feeling, surely – proof that he  _wasn’t_  enough for Kent.

Because what Kent needs, apparently, is him  _and_ Bitty, and Jack needs Bitty  _and_  Kent, and Bitty, God bless him, apparently needs Kent and Jack too.

**Author's Note:**

> (i.e. the summary of The Middle of this fic that just… didn’t happen)
> 
> I saw a Jack/Bitty soulmate post that got me thinking about how Jack and Kent in their Q days would react to finding out that they don’t have each other’s words on them - Jack doesn’t have Kent’s words, at least, and Kent’s words are so generic anyone could have said them, including Jack - and trying to have a relationship anyway and ultimately knowing they’re doomed and watching the clock waiting for the day that everything’s going to go to shit, which would obviously contribute to anxiety and misery on both sides and everything’s a total trainwreck and it all ends horribly as per canon.
> 
> Then Jack meets Bitty and turns out Jack’s words are Bitty’s words, but Bitty doesn’t have Jack’s, so Jack is so in two minds about it. On the one hand, Jack has Bitty’s words on him: that has to mean something. On the other hand, Bitty’s words are so obviously not his that it cuts him up a bit inside, because he really likes him, but he can’t go through what happened with Kent again.
> 
> Then, obviously, Bitty meets Parse, except Jack isn’t there, and Bitty goes everywhere to look for him, then turns out Parse found him first and it’s trainwreck 2.0 and then Parse is leaving and Jack is crying on the other side of the door, Bitty can hear him, and none of them know what to do.
> 
> Then Jack graduates and goes to play for the Falconers and tries to ignore everything he’s feeling about everyone until one day he wakes up to find that Bitty is coming to watch him play the Aces...
> 
> ehh..  
> I'm on [tumblr](http://quietest-one.tumblr.com/)!


End file.
